Soldier Readiness Processing: Time for a New Paradigm in Managing Musculoskeletal Injuries After Deployment?

Background: The drowning impact that musculoskeletal injuries (MSI) have on Soldier readiness, deployability, and escalating health care costs is growing. These injuries are associated with approximately 25 million lost duty days each year. The need to curb costs and improve efficacy and efficiency of health care delivery is pressing.

Dynamic vs. static-stretching warm up: the effect on power and agility performance.

The purpose of this study was to compare the effect of a dynamic warm up (DWU) with a static-stretching warm up (SWU) on selected measures of power and agility. Thirty cadets at the United States Military Academy completed the study (14 women and 16 men, ages 18-24 years). On 3 consecutive days, subjects performed 1 of the 2 warm up routines (DWU or SWU) or performed no warm up (NWU).

Comparison of injury rates between cadets with limb length inequalities and matched control subjects over 1 year of military training and athletic participation.

Objectives: To compare lower-limb overuse injury and low back pain incidence among cadets with and without limb length inequality (LLI) over 1 year of military training and athletic participation.

Methods: A total of 1,100 cadets were screened for LLIs; 126 of 1,100 were identified to have a LLI of > 0.5 cm and were assigned a matched control cadet.